Video: Wakashio’s stern still blights Mauritian waters
Stern section of grounded box ships still aground on reef 375 days after environmental disaster off Mauritius.
The stern of the boxship Wakashio is still sitting on the reef the Nagasaki Shipping-owned vessel struck over a year ago off Mauritius.
The 300m newcastlemax ran aground on 25th July 2020, spilling 1,000 tonnes of oil into pristine tropical waters, creating Mauritius’ worst-ever ecological disaster.
Now, more than a year after the accident, and despite a pledge to clean up the site from the vessel’s charterer, MOL, the battered remains of the ship’s rear end still blight the seascape.
The Wakashio ran aground after her master, Captain Sunil Kumar Nandeshwar, closed the Mauritian coast to within 2 km in order to give his crew the chance “to enter an area within the communication range of mobile phones”. Nandeshwar and his chief officer, Tilakaratna Subodha, are being charged with endangering safe navigation.
To think that this horrific oil spill was caused by crew of MV Wakashio celebrating a birthday, wanting a WiFi SIGNAL & sailing dangerously close to shore off Mauritius, running aground on a coral reef. The sort of damage that lasts forever. Humans are BAD for this planet. pic.twitter.com/ruitC8QNYc
